Show and Travel Day Numero Uno

So our first show was in Viola Elementary School in a town called Suffern, NY (about 45 minutes from the city). We had one show at 10:00AM with a load in scheduled for 8:00AM. The trains were a bit wonky in the morning so a few actors were late but nothing worse than 5 minutes. After that it was smooth sailing. We had a lovely ride with beautiful weather all the way to Suffern and the cast got used to driving in the passenger van quickly (which they have dubbed Sexxxy Louise...and I am told the three Xs are necessary). We finished load in right before half hour and the kids started filing in.

Due to the nature of the space, small, the stage was a bit cramped and there was no cross over to get from one side of the stage to the other. When the actors needed to cross I told them to just keep walking and ignore the kids. Sure enough as they walked behind each set piece and was shown briefly to the audience in between, the kids FREAKED OUT. There was major screaming and giggling and this prompted the cast to give the kids a bit of a show. Some hopped between sets and others wagged their 'tails' a bit as they strolled by. I put the kibosh on this as the kids started to get a little out of control.

The reason I wanted them to stop was that I was worried the teachers would get annoyed with their kids and shush them forcefully. I know this sounds silly but an angry or annoyed shush from a teacher or guardian can quell the kids not just for the pre-show...but the entire show. They will be too scared to clap and too scared to enjoy themselves for fear of being shushed by their teachers. This is a tragedy in the world of children shows.

As I expected the teachers started yelling and shushing at the kids making the outcome a subdued audience. They became more lively towards the end of the show when they realized they wouldn't get yelled at for enjoying themselves but most of the first half was a giggle every now and then and not knowing when to clap. Albeit this could also be attributed to just a general ignorance to theatre going conventions...which to be honest from grades K-3 is understandable.

Load out went smoothly then we had our first 'family' or company meal together in Applebee's ( a good ol' standby if all the town restaurants look sketchy). We chatted about the upcoming travel day we had among other things and then headed back to NYC.

Today we had our first travel day. We met at the garage at 10:00AM and arrived at our destination, Wysox, PA, at about 2:00PM. The drive was great although I am not a fan of driving through PA. The roads are twisty turny and the drivers are as well. Upon arriving at the hotel we all agreed to meet in the lobby around 3 for food. We asked the receptionist where we should go and her manager, who was looming over her shoulder, instantly pointed to the restaurant that had a poster plastered to every wall and window. He said 'You'll definitely want to go there'. We shrugged and off we went, about a mile away. We laughed at how insistent he was on us going to this specific establishment and assumed he owned the joint.

We arrived at the restaurant and sure enough about 5 minutes after ordering our food the manager of the hotel showed up. Our eyes popped wide and we all ducked our heads to avoid him seeing us giggle. At dinner we discussed possibly dressing up in themes for Halloween (some ideas were title characters of 90's TV shows or Clue) Later that evening Sarah, who plays Maddy in the show, was looking at the Wysox Facebook page and discovered it only had 3 fans and the town population was 1,204! The manager of our hotel probably created the acebook page...hell he probably was the mayor of the town. It just goes to show...there is no town too small for Click, Clack, Moo. We perform to towns of aaaalll populations.

Tomorrow we have a 9:30AM and a 12:30PM. Load in time is 7:30AM...Hoorah for coffee!

I leave you with a picture of me driving Cargo Cathy wearing Cameron's sunglasses.

Cameron's foxy 'Bro' glasses as he calls them.